Citing Economic Woes, Hell Will Close Its Doors

For over 2000 years it was the “go to” company in post-life housing and employment but today HELL filed for Chapter 11 and announced it will soon be closing its doors. Shares of HELL (NASDAQ) plummeted during the day and closed at $1.20, down from $307.75 at yesterday’s high.

CEO Lucifer Diablo said, "All of Hell's clients will be transported to India and for this we apologize. Nobody deserves to be treated like that."

HELL founder and CEO, Lucifer Diablo, said at a news conference today that business has been great but the day-to-day costs of operations have taken their toll.

“Year after year, we have continued to bring in more customers. We continually beat quarterly estimates and, in fact, business has been so good, we’ve had trouble processing all the new applicants,” said Diablo. “Last year was our busiest year ever for sinner placement. Between all the pedophiles, lawyers, congressmen, IRS agents and terrorists, we had a record year, but we still lost money in the long run.”

Energy expert Paul Dennerier said that rising fuel costs played a major role in bringing down the company.

“HELL uses more coal and oil than all of Europe combined. Even a small increase in fuel prices has a massive impact on their bottom line,” Dennerier explained. “HELL uses massive, antiquated furnaces that burn fuel at an alarming rate as the ovens struggle to maintain high temperatures. HELL failed to reinvest in infrastructure. They needed fuel-efficient furnaces, better flame throwers and more practical torture chambers.”

Last April, a glitch in HELL’s brand-new computer processing system caused a huge backup in Limbo and millions of souls were sent to Pugatory by mistake.

“The fallout from that computer error was catastrophic. We got a lot of bad publicity because of that. We worked hard to build our bad-boy reputation, but when we sent millions of our customers to just-outside-Heaven by mistake, the market lost confidence,” said Diablo.

Things got worse for HELL in June when an explosion shut down the main furnace and HELL cooled to a balmy 85 degrees. The shutdown forced the closing of HELL’s subterranean resorts in Camden, NJ, Atlanta and Detroit, resulting in the layoffs of nearly 18,000 minions. In July, nearly 12,000 post-life coal shovelers, coal-whippers, and maintenance crew were let go when the Gary, Indiana heat production plant closed without notice.

In a desperate measure to cut costs and avoid bankruptcy, HELL began outsourcing soul placement to China and Africa. HELL’s subsidiary, Afterlife Persecution, began opening franchise operations in India.

“Our Indian franchises are doing extremely well,” said Lucifer. “Indian furnaces burn rubbish instead of oil and there’s plenty of trash there. The streets are literally filled with it. The climate of India is already unbearably hot and humid, and the swarms of indigenous people provide a stench of garbage, sewerage and body odor. India is, by its nature, Hell.”